For understanding people’s feelings, facial expressions are significant, but they are not the only important aspect.
Facial expressions play a key role in helping us recognize someone’s emotions. However, this is just one part of a larger equation. Research by Dr. Leda Berio and Professor Albert Newen from the Institute of Philosophy II at Ruhr University Bochum, Germany, suggests that identifying emotions is not a standalone function but rather part of a broader process that assists us in forming an overall impression of another individual. This comprehensive impression includes various factors like physical traits, cultural characteristics, and background details. Their findings were published on September 24, 2024, in the journal Philosophy and Phenomenological Research.
How context shapes our emotional recognition
In the 1970s, it was proposed that facial expressions are a clear reflection of our feelings. Researcher Paul Ekman identified primary emotional states—such as fear, anger, disgust, joy, and sadness—associated with distinct facial expressions common across cultures. However, Newen points out that there are many instances where the typical facial expression does not provide the most accurate insight into someone’s feelings. For instance, if someone shows a facial expression commonly associated with fear after being rejected by a waiter, most people interpret it as anger due to the situation’s context. Our expectation of anger based on context can overshadow the facial expression seen.
“Moreover, we can sometimes perceive emotions without seeing someone’s face. For instance, if a person is being threatened by a barking dog, we can recognize their fear even if we see them only from behind, reflecting a posture of freeze or fright,” Berio explains.
Emotion recognition is part of our overall perception of a person
According to Berio and Newen, recognizing emotions is a component of our broader ability to form impressions of individuals. People use various traits when assessing others, including physical features like skin color, age, and gender, as well as cultural markers such as clothing and general attractiveness, along with situational cues like facial expressions, gestures, and posture.
Using these factors, individuals quickly form impressions and link social status and personality traits to them. For example, “If we perceive a person as a woman displaying a negative emotion, we are more inclined to interpret it as fear. Conversely, we are likely to interpret a similar expression from a man as anger,” Berio notes.
Background knowledge influences our evaluation
In addition to physical and situational observations, we often possess detailed mental images of people in our social circles—such as family members, friends, and colleagues—based on past experiences. “For instance, when a family member with Parkinson’s exhibits a facial expression typically associated with anger, we learn to interpret that expression as neutral due to our understanding that a rigid expression is characteristic of the condition,” Berio states.
Our background knowledge also encompasses stereotypes about various professions. “We often have preconceived notions about the emotional expressions of certain job roles, like doctors, students, and laborers,” Newen explains. “For example, we generally view doctors as less emotional, which affects how we interpret their expressions.”
In essence, individuals utilize a combination of characteristics and background knowledge to gauge another person’s emotions, often looking beyond just facial expressions. “This has important implications for emotion recognition using artificial intelligence (AI). AI systems will need to consider more than just facial expressions to achieve reliable emotional recognition, a capability that most current AI systems lack,” Newen concludes.
